Topic: Which srt of raspberry fruits on last years wood?

[chriscross1966]

My Aldi/Lidl purchased raspberries prduced a small amount of fruit on the existing growth this year and have sent out several decent sized canes that haven't fruited, so I'm assuming it's a variet that fruits on old wood.... will the technique next year be to take fruit on this years wood then prune it out and tie in next years wood... repeating each year and when would I prune, autumn after leaf drop?

[Ellen K]

Yes that sounds exactly right.  I am tryiing to get to grips with this too.  I inherited a patch of raspberries which never did anything for the previous tenant but this year they finally gave a good crop after much trial and error with the pruning.

So like you said, this month I cut out all of the canes that fruited this year.  And left all the new growth that will fruit next year.  I did the pruning now because a saw a neighbour who always gets a massive crop from what looks like half a dozen canes do the same.  Also it gives room to weed a bit and space for the new growth to ..... er, grow.

But also interested to hear any advice from experts.

[goodlife]

Well..things are not as straight forward as that..sorry..I'm going to make things bit more difficult now.
Generally you would prune out old canes out now after fruiting if they are summer fruiting variety.
Where as if they are autumn fruiting you cut them off in winter/spring.But...many autumn fruiting varieties do fruit from previous years canes too..those that have already yield a crop. ::)
Garden where I work, I planted two rows of autumn fruiting Heritage raspberries. On one row only half of the old canes are cut of during winter, those left are shortened bit and they will yield summer crop. In spring the new growth comes and those canes will fruit autumn..usual time ::) The old canes are now ready for cutting to give room to the new ones..they are about ready for flowering.
The other row is grown usual method...flowering now..fruiting soon..cut all back later on.
Reason I started this two way growing was to see if they are just 'freaks' or meant to do so.. ;D..still don't know which.. ;D
But I've done same in lottie with my unknown autumn variety...and yes..they do are 'freaks'.
So Autumn varieties seem be ok for 'double' cropping where as summer ones do die back properly and can be cut back after cropping. They are usually cut back sooner rather than later only to give room for the new canes..otherwise things get messy...but left on it won't affect the fruiting of the new canes next year.

[realfood]

Autumn fruiting rasps naturally will fruit on both new and old wood. However, it is sometimes easier to cut out all the fruited wood in winter, to prevent a "fancle". I also find that the fruit on the old wood tends to be rather smaller than the fruit on the new wood.
I also grow true summer fruiting rasps to extend the season.

[Ellen K]

I sometimes wonder if I am missing a trick if I do something simple.

But the raspberry plants left behind on me plot are definitely the early / last year's wood fruiting types.  I took out everything but the new growth last year and this year got a good crop of nice berries, not quite as early as strawberries but I was definitely eating raspberries before most on the site.

I've got some Autumn Bliss as well (bought and planted last year) and I cut them all down to the ground last year and they are fruiting now and are good eating too.

It depends on what you are trying to do.  I'd like to get the fruit harvest spread out over the season and not have to buy any.  So the separate early fruiters fill a gap before the currants and goosberries are ready. That works for me.

[martinburo]

The order in which raspberries fruit is: summer raspberries, old autumn raspberries, new autumn raspberries. It works best to prune both summer and autumn raspberries after their summer crop, when they are about 15 months old, and the summer ones have fruited once and the autumn ones twice. I also shorten my autumn raspberries in late winter a bit, but haven't found out yet whether this helps.

[realfood]

The order in which my rasps fruit is Old Autumn rasps, Summer rasps, New Autumn rasps.